Various designs have been developed for plastic produce bags as well as for methods for making and dispensing the bags.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,611,627 issued to Belias et al. is directed to an easy open thermoplastic bag. The bag is manufactured from a flattened tube of thermoplastic material with transverse heat seals. The transverse heat seals along with the sinusoidally oscillating paths form the tube into two halves or bags. The result of the transverse heat-seals and the cutting paths, is that two bags are formed with seamless bottoms. The sinusoidal cuts in the front and back portions of the tube respectively give rise to a mouth or opening for the bags with tabs that allow for the bags to be more easily opened.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,164,170 issued to Nordin, discloses a method of making bags. The patent describes the manufacturing of a string of bags from a hose-like blank. Since a hose-like blank is used, the bottoms of the resultant bags are continuous in nature and the sides of a bag are formed by welds with separation lines in order to separate one set of bags from another. The hose-like blank is cut into two substantially equal parts along a center line while the cutting lines are offset to form the handles of the finished bag.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,811,418, issued to Reifenhauser is directed to a method for the manufacture of plastic bags with welded side seams. The patent describes the production of two bags side-by-side in parallel from tubular film that is fed in a first direction. The tubular film is cut in a sinusoidal configuration in the center of the film, thus forming two semitubes to form two side seam bags with welded side seams and handle opening portions.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,444,685 issued to Waters is directed to the multiple fabrication method and apparatus for forming liquid-type envelope bags. A supply roll of material with defined edges is passed through feed rolls and around a former plate in order to bring the edges together along a line with a defined space between them. The edges ultimately form the opening of the envelope after having been cut by a cutter into separate envelopes. A pair of transverse welds are formed in the process and the paired envelopes are cut by means of cross-cut knife.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,967,663 issued to Vaquero et al. is directed to a thermoplastic bag structure. The thermoplastic tube is cut into two portions by means of cutting instruments that form sinusoidal paths and hence sinusoidal cuts. Transverse heat seals and transverse perforations separate the tube into pairs of bags such that the folded bottom edge does not require heat sealing and the openings of the resultant bags have “tabs” so that they may be more easily opened.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,488,222, issued to West et al., describes A folded gusseted plastic bag has a first side gusset formed by first, second, and third longitudinal folds, a second side gusset formed by fourth, fifth, and sixth longitudinal folds, a seventh longitudinal fold being on a side of the bag containing the first, second, and third folds and forming a first folded bag flap, and an eighth longitudinal fold which is on a side of the bag containing the fourth, fifth, and sixth folds, the eighth fold forming a second folded bag flap. The folded gusseted bag also is folded into a total of at least eight contiguous plies. A roll of the folded, gusseted bags includes a continuous web of the folded, flattened bags joined along perforated severance lines. Preferably the perforated severance lines further comprise a centrally-located slit. The dispensing system utilizes the roll of folded-gusseted bags in combination with a dispenser comprising: (i) a support member for attachment to a support surface; (ii) a pair of guide channels carried by the support member for rotatably supporting the roll of plastic bags for rotation of the roll on the core; (iii) a tongue spaced apart from and carried by said support member in a predetermined position corresponding to the predetermined position of the slit in the tear line.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,379,292, issued to Simhaee, illustrates a continuous web of bags formed of a plurality of layers to be separated along a line of perforations that extends through all of the layers transverse of the web, in which at least one of the outermost layers is detached from the web at the separation line. Apparatus accomplishes this detachment in a moving web by engaging the outermost layer outer surface and exerting a force in a manner to produce the detachment from the separation line. Both the outermost upper and lower web layers can be detached at the separation line.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,967,663, issued to Vaquero et al., discloses a thermoplastic bag structure and method for making and packaging thermoplastic bags such that their tops are easily identified and the bags are easily opened. The method for producing these bags begins with cutting a flattened thermoplastic tube into two portions. At least one of the two portions is then collapsed to form a sheet of material having a pair of thermoplastic layers, a straight folded bottom edge and a pair of top edges, at least one of which has a skewed-cut. Bag side structures are formed in the sheet of material at about bag-width distances apart. The bags are then folded a predetermined number of times, in a direction transverse to the bag side structures, so that the skewed-cut top edge(s) of each of the bags remains exposed.
While other variations exist, the above-described designs for plastic produce bags are typical of those encountered in the prior art. It is an objective of the present invention to provide a produce bag without a bottom seam for additional strength in the bag bottom. It is a further objective to provide a produce bag that provides means to easily identify and open the bag. It is a still further objective of the invention to provide the above-described capabilities in a produce bag that can be easily dispensed from a roll using a compact and inexpensive dispenser. It is a further objective to provide bags that can be formed into compact rolls on cores or without cores. It is yet a further objective to provide a means to manufacture such produce bags using economical and reliable high-speed methods. While some of the objectives of the present invention are disclosed in the prior art, none of the inventions found include all of the requirements identified.